In the Last Days of Azrael
by entercreativename
Summary: Ten years have past and time has taken its toll on PPTH. A new generation of doctors have taken over, but one needs guidance from the man accustomed to being on the outskirts of society, House. Please R&R!
1. Day 1

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Day One: **_

Have you ever wondered what happened to the man who disappeared? Neither did I, I just saw him walk down the road, and then leave; never to turn his head back towards us. Have you ever wondered what happened to the man who smiled at you at the bus stop? Neither did I, I just looked back into my newspaper, ignoring him.

But what if I did pay attention to him? Just once?

I saw a man once, at the bus stop while I was waiting to go to work. Normally, I wouldn't have given the time of day for him, I would have just looked at him and glance back into my newspaper, reading the day's headlines, indulging in the seventy-five cents I paid for the only intellectual sustenance I would receive for the day. I would just read until the bus came to pick me up for work. Except today.

Today was different.

I first saw him about a month ago. He was sitting at the end of the bench on Baker Street, near the old white brick apartment building with the glistening historical plaque. He sat there alone, just staring at the key he fiddled with in his right hand; his left hand held onto a cane that was currently supporting his chin. It was obvious he was deep in thought, but I didn't know about what. Before I realized that I was staring, he looked at me and yelled, "You got a problem?"

I looked away, and at that moment, the bus came. But he did not get on.

I looked back at the bus stop once I was on the bus, and saw him fiddling with the key again in his hand. Part of me wanted to know more, but the bus turned the corner before I could see what it was I was looking for. I sat in my seat and turned my eyes back to my newspaper, reading the headlines for another short while before having to clock in.

When I got off the bus after work at its Baker Street stop, I paused for a moment where the anonymous man had been seated. I slid my hand along the wood of the back of the bench, feeling its rough fibers caress my skin. I continued just to feel and observe the bench, the grain of the wood dancing in front of my eyes. It was like magic. I sat down in the spot where the man had been and looked down at the ground where his eyes would have met beyond the small key earlier. What was he doing there? I vaguely remember seeing him before, maybe around the block, or maybe at the grocer I cashiered at for minimum wage. Either way, something about him caught me off guard and made me stop to think.


	2. Day 2

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Day Two:**_

When you go to the grocer or even to that Wal-Mart on the edge of town, do you stop and think about the lives of the people who work there? I never used to. I used to be the one who would rush in, grab the items I needed, and ran through the check-out, talking into my cell phone the entire time; I never noticed a thing around me. That's what is beautiful about a mid-life crisis, even if it happens in your twenties; you suddenly notice things. Yesterday, I was in med school, spent time with wonderful friends and colleagues, and had a promising future. By day I would attend classes and spend time at the hospital, attending anything that might help me get ahead in medicine. At night, I would write letters back and forth to loved ones. I was working towards the life I had dreamed of. Then, everything changed, my life had shattered. My husband died in Iraq.

He was my backbone, my support, even if he was on the other side of the world. Suddenly, the color black had surrounded me. A military funeral came and went. I found I could no longer concentrate on the life I was working on for myself. Time stopped, and so did life. I went about my business in med school, but everything suddenly felt numb. I had no emotion.

I looked at my bank account one day and realized that I had overdrawn for the second time that month. I called the bank, thinking it was an error. But it wasn't. The money had stopped coming. I called my parents, only to find out they were out of the country. I called my sister, and she just acted as empty as she always had. My friends were gone. I was alone in Princeton. For the first time since my husband's death, I cried.

That was ten years ago. Bush was kicked out of office in 2007, only to have friends of Cheney come in and take over. Before the war I had supported him, then my husband died. After that day, I supported the troops like everyone else, but hated their Commander in Chief. In January 2009, things got worse as Donald Rumsfeld took the oath of office. Poverty rose faster than the death toll in Iraq, as the insurgency banded together to form the New Iraqi Army. The economy died and the middle class had practically disappeared, save for a few persons in good jobs. The loss of jobs meant the loss of insurance, which meant a sudden plunge of revenue in the health care industry, the industry I was now employed in. To think I used to be an optimist.

So here I sat, tomorrow on the bench at the Baker Street bus stop.

I don't know why I bothered to buy that paper every day, but I still did. Maybe old habits died hard. I really didn't need to know what was happening, but I still tried to follow the news. Maybe it would allow me to pretend that one day, things would get better. Maybe not. Maybe it just was an indulgence left from my life as a med school student. Or maybe it just made me still feel connected to the world somehow.

"Are you going to read that part?" the man with the cane called out from my right. Startled from my thoughts, I just looked up at him, my mouth hanging slightly open in surprise on that cold, damp day.

"No, you can have it sir, sports don't really interest me anymore," I handed him the sports section I had haphazardly strewn to the side, almost forgetting how precious the paper had become as I still took it for granted. As he held out his hand to take it from me, I noticed how badly he shook. Thought it was cold and damp out, and the man was getting up in years, it caught me off guard that he did so. "Are you okay?"

"Down on my luck, just like you," he said after a sigh that somehow helped to control the shaking a bit.

"I have a job, a good one, and that's more than a lot of people have." I had to defend myself. Though I regularly spoke to random strangers at work, this was different. Here we were, two random people sitting at a bus stop just exchanging a few words, words about luck. I never talked about that, it just seemed too personal.

"You might have that job, but it still doesn't mean anything. When did he die?" He gestured at my left hand, the hand that passed him the sports section just seconds ago.

"Ten years ago. How did you know?" I asked, involuntarily rubbing my hand.

"You have a tan line on your ring finger. Also, judging by how you're always here alone, before and after work, you probably don't have anything else."

"I have an apartment."

"What else?"

I looked at him, furious. Why would a random stranger just suddenly start analyzing my life? Especially one who looked further in the dumps than me? I was about to respond, about to insult him and tell him to stay out of my business, when I heard the squealing of the brakes from my bus pull up. "I'll be late for work. Good day, sir." I nodded at him and ran towards the bus, almost crying the moment I got on.


	3. Day 3

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Day Three:**_

Rain. Why does it always seem to sooth my spirit, if I even have one? I waited at the bus stop this morning, alone thankfully, in it, just letting it cleanse me, baptize me, to a day that is anew with despair. I sat on the bus alone, hugging my newspaper on the way to work and later sacrificing it as an umbrella to dash in the sudden downpour the block from the bus stop to work. Thankfully, I had a dry set of clothes in my locker there.

It was nice to be alone for a change. I spend my entire day around random strangers whom I pretend to know, and thanks to the paper I usually have in front of me, usually succeed in doing. I used to love people until my husband's death, then, I just tolerated them. Now, and because of the time I did spend in med school, I have gradually learned to despise them. However, that morning, I was just grateful that I did not see the man from the bus stop. He frightened me, and I did not know why.

"Morning. How's that new apartment working for you?" my coworker looked up from the desk where she sat, the pink of her shirt radiating up and warming the lobby area where we were.

"Pretty good, it's an old neighborhood though, and to be honest, it seems as if the halls are haunted."

"Good chance of it then," she handed me a file and told me where I was assigned for the next ten, fifteen minutes of my day. "By the way, where is your new apartment?"

"Oh, 221B Baker Street."

"Address sounds familiar, but I don't know why. By the way, good luck with that chart, he seems to be a crazy. Possible drug seeker."

"Wonderful. Thanks Brenda."

I looked down at the file. Unexplained leg pain. Thinking of that always made me remember a class I had in my first year of college on diagnostics. Don't really remember much about the class, except the man who taught it one day was completely different from any other teacher I had in my life. He himself walked with a cane. Too bad I don't remember his name.

I looked back at the file, Brenda had managed to take a rather sketchy history but totally missed the patient's name. I put my hand in my pocket and pulled out my cheat sheet of psych doctors as a quick reference in case I needed to call one. My first crazy.

I knocked on the door, entered, and introduced myself without looking up from the chart, which had been a huge mistake. When I did look up, the man with the cane from the bus stop sat in front of me.

"Good thing that it's a _free_ clinic, otherwise I'd never be able to afford it, _Doctor_!"

I sighed. Was this man stalking me? First, the bus stop for nearly a month, then he's talking to me there, and now he's followed me to work? "Did you follow me here?"

"Finished reading the Sports section and wanted Arts and Entertainment next."

I stared at the man in disgust, and before I could say anything he cut me off.

"Relax Doc. I'm not stalking you, this is the only free clinic left in the county. The others died out ages ago. Besides, it has a history for me."

"How are things going, Mister?" I was trying to trick him into giving me his name.

"Just call me SpongeBob today Doctor," he paused and I tried to hide my hospital ID quickly as I tried to hide my small smile at his choice of a name, "Livingston. Nice name, has a good flair."

"Look, I'm busy, can we get on with it or should I just call psych right now?"

"Hear me out. My leg hurts, and it's worse now than it was yesterday."

"It's raining out and a cold front is coming it. Your arthritis is flaring up. Have some Tylenol." I handed him a small sample bottle of the medication, hoping this would buy him off.

"So you're not going to _look_ at the leg? I'm no doctor, or maybe I am, but you should probably _examine_ me first." The man gave an innocent look at me and gestured down to his leg. I moved back the paper blanket Brenda had laid over it and saw an old faded scar over a large indentation.

"What happened to your leg Bob?" I sat on the examination stool, knowing this would probably take more time than I was willing to put in. I had my own patients in my own department I needed to attend to before they died or something.

"Well, I had an infarction fifteen years ago. It had gotten better after I left my job, but now it's acting up again."

I continued through a physical exam, noting a limited range of motion and pain upon flexion. "Well, it looks like it's probably just arthritis, judging by your history and age. However, I'd like to schedule an MRI just to be safe. Your file has no address on it, where do you live?"

The man's face changed from a look of prodding suspicion to pain and torment, signaling to me that he was just another unknown person trying to survive on the streets of Princeton, nothing more. "Bob, I'll admit you for the night, run some tests tomorrow morning, and send you on your way."

The expression on his face turned back to one of benevolence and he smiled, "Will you be my doctor?"

"Hardly. Orthopedics will be taking you on."

"Where do you work then?"

"Just upstairs."

With that, I exited and handed the file to Brenda, instructing her on the admissions for the newest patient at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, not that much teaching was being done anymore with the university having gone bankrupt three years ago.


	4. Day 3, Later

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Later, Day Three:**_

Refuge. That is what I thought of my office up on the third floor next to Oncology. Rumors still float around about their department head and the previous Dean of Medicine, but no one really knows what happened to them. Some say they have died, while others say they have just retired. Either way, the hospital belongs to my generation of doctors now. Every so often I hear whisperings about the former department head for the department I work in, diagnostic medicine, but they usually go away after a day. Something tragic happened, but I do not know what.

After the man from the bus stop was admitted, my day took a turn for the worse and the two critical patients we had been treating in Diagnostics had died without an explanation. They were getting better, and all their lab work showed that they were fighting off the infection. Eric Foreman, the Dean of Medicine and our department head is even taking it hard, though he won't show it. We had all expected them to survive. But they didn't.

That's why the refuge of my office is beautiful, wonderful even. Many times during a difficult case, I'll just hide in there, going over lab results until the numbers and symptom lists start to blur in front of my eyes. Tonight though, I was looking forward to just hiding from reality.

"Nice office you got here Doc!" a familiar voice yelled out from _my_ chair at _my_ desk. "How'd you get the big-girl office?"

"Seniority."

Sure enough, sitting in front of me was the man from the bus stop, Bob, bare feet up on my desk, rummaging through its drawers, and the folders for the cases that had died earlier today open in front of him.

"You missed something Dr. Livingston."

"_We_ didn't miss anything, and you have five seconds to tell me what you're doing here before I call security." My hand was on the red phone that was recently installed after an incident in pediatrics two months ago.

"Just trying to help."

"You're not a doctor."

"Okay, so I was bored and I wandered into here."

There was a glimmer in his eye now, one of hope, and I had never seen that from him before in all the times I had seen him at the bus stop.

"How did you know this was my office?" I walked over to my desk and sat in the chair in front of it.

"I didn't know it was your office, and in my own defense, I was bored, needed something to do."

"Try watching TV like all the other patients. There's good medical drama on Fox tonight, try watching that."

The man stood up and gently took his cane, age and time showing its haggard effects on his face. I looked over at my desk and the files that had been open were missing. I looked back over at the man, who was about reach the door, "Give me those files back Bob."

"My name's not Bob."

"Then what should I call you, Sherlock?"

He turned around slowly, painfully, his body an echo of the power it must have once been in its day, before the infarction ever happened. As he handed me the files, we made eye contact and this intense blue met my vision, "I guess that would do nicely."

"I was just being facetious."

"And I really like this office. Great balcony. Good night Doctor Livingston."

The man walked off with his cane towards the elevators, and I looked down into my hand. Not only had he tried to take two of my patient files from my desk, but he also pulled a third one, a patient with similar symptoms to the two who died today. A test result was circled in red ink, with a note, "Try something simple, go to their homes," written next to it.

Son of a gun, why didn't we think of that earlier? Probably because the Dean, sitting in his nice posh office below all of us, never let us leave the hospital grounds to investigate environmental causes of illnesses, like I've been insisting on since I started here two years ago. Something about it going bad once when he was a fellow.

Too bad he never talked about those days. So much for a fellowship here.

Diagnostic medicine had, ten years ago, been considered the department of last resort. One genius diagnostician and three fellows working under him. Foreman was the last to leave from the original group, and now he won't even speak of those days, just of "we need to respect the patient's privacy." When I asked him about the history of the department, all he told me was that a lot of good people put their careers at stake for a mad man.

Bull. His style of medicine wasn't working anymore, and judging by our success rates, things were just getting worse. Maybe I would try tonight to go and investigate covertly.


	5. Day 4, Early Morning

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

**_Early Morning Day Four:_**

Have you ever done something so utterly crazy, so professionally destructive, that the only reason you are still around, still surviving, is a reason beyond crazy, one yet unrealized? Have you ever taken that advice from that psychic phone line you called late one night on a drunken dare, only to turn around, laugh, and take another shot of vodka before running across town to complete your new found destiny? Have you ever waken up from a dream, only to realize that you're still dreaming?

I have.

Here I am sitting in the office of Dr. Eric Foreman, Dean of Medicine at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, knowing that unless I think of something fast, I will be out on the streets living in the box next to the nameless homeless man with a cane on Baker Street.

Crazy. Is that what I've really become?

Maybe it is, since I see Foreman standing above me, yelling at me as I'm huddled in the metal chair he brought down from Diagnostic Medicine years ago, a punishment for young doctors like myself to endure as part of the treacherous lecture he is giving to me right now. I am staring at his dark brown eyes and seeing his lips move, but I hear nothing. I had to interject; I was being punished for breaking a hospital rule, yes, but what I did was right.

"Dr. Foreman, I just prevented an outbreak of salmonella, something that needed to be reported not only to the media but to the local and national health agencies, and you're yelling at me. Why?"

"Listen to me Livingston. You may have gotten lucky this time, but there probably won't be a next time. Just take a better history, don't go searching for zebras when some crazy fool tells you that they're there. I'm protecting you from what could be a career-devastating move. Delinquency is not something to be appreciated in a doctor. People look up to you; your patients look up to you. We do not break into the homes of people on a whim and a prayer." That time I heard Foreman's words, and they hit me hard. "Why did you do this? You're a good doctor, a dedicated one, and you're throwing it all away, for what? You wanted to follow up on gut instinct? Wrong. That can be done here in the lab, not out on the streets."

"Doctor Foreman, what I did saved hundreds if not thousands of lives." I felt sheepish, like I was back in the first grade again, being lectured by my father as my mother looked on from across the room, crying. "Why do we have this rule in place anyways? All it is doing is preventing us from pursuing better patient care." I had to be quick, use his rules, his words, to argue back against him before the slight shaking in my hand materialized as something more that he might see if he were to be lucky, which I would not let him be.

"Look, I created that rule because of something bad that happened ten years ago to me and the other fellows in Diagnostic Medicine. That's all you need to know."

"What happened Foreman?" Tempers flared, and nurses stopped where they were in the clinic outside his office. We were both yelling now. Little did I realize though that someone had put his hand on the receiver of his phone somewhere in the hospital and was dialing a number with a clear intent in mind; a crazy intent in his mind.

"Livingston, it's in the past, and that's all you need to know. What happened to us, to me, is nothing that should be repeated. All it did was lead to a lot more problems than it did answers, and because of it, our hospital changed drastically. House," he paused; the look on his face revealed that he told me too much already.

"Who is House?" That name sounded vaguely familiar, if it were a person he was talking about. One could never really tell though since he suffered brain damage ten years ago, or so Brenda had told me. Foreman had learned to use this difficulty to his advantage, and he was probably just trying to lead me on.

"You don't need to know that. All you need to know is that you are putting yourself in danger."

I rolled my eyes; all I cared about was the well being of our patients, my safety had not mattered since my husband died. All Foreman really cared about was preventing lawsuits, especially in the day and age of near-martial law. I suppose he had a point; if any of us were to get caught breaking and entering we would end up in prison, our careers ending as swiftly as they had begun. I was about to speak when the phone rang; it being Foreman's office, he answered.

"Yes?"

A pause; I stared at him, trying to keep myself from crying.

"But, no, it can't be. You're dead. I was there the night they brought you three to the ER." Foreman had a look of shock and horror on his face as he swallowed hard. "What she did was wrong, not right. We all paid because of your mistakes, now never call this number again."

Foreman slammed the phone onto its cradle and stared at the wall before him, forgetting that I was there. What had I just witnessed? Was this yet another crazy act from a crazy person, or a revelation from the past?

One thing I did know: I just had the perfect escape given to me and I took advantage of that.

Upstairs, a man with ashen stubble sat in his hospital bed, twirling a cane in one hand and smiling for the first time in ten years.


	6. Day 4, Midday

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Midday, Day Four:**_

Rounds are a revolving door that I never have liked, and I have always tried my hardest to find a way out of them, today being no exception. But, today was not my day. I stood in a group of other doctors in room 311 in front of the man with the cane I had admitted yesterday, being part of the team from Diagnostics and our Dean to take his history. Foreman was standing in front of us, blocking our view of the patient's smug stare on his face, telling us the newest facts on him.

But, I could not listen, I could not watch. Not after our meeting in his office this morning.

Instead, I just looked at the patient in the bed, our newest patient. We were gathered above him, like crows waiting to gather the dead carcass, not acknowledging that he was there as we concluded our first round of the differential diagnosis.

The team left and there I stood looking at the man from the bus stop, the nameless face of Princeton's homeless people scattered about. How he came to the care of our department remained a mystery.

"You can stop staring now _Doctor!_"

I looked up and was pointing his cane at me; I could not move as I knew that the only reason I had found the answer to our last case was because of him. I stood there, my arms crossed above my chest and the three charts of the patients with salmonella. I was thankful, relieved almost, to be in the room with him as he seemed to know more than my own boss.

"The charts, how did you know to look in their homes?" I asked, looking down at the patient's red ink marks on the labs of my previous patients.

"It was the only place you didn't look; should have been the first."

"We're not allowed to…"

"It's a bad rule. And, it's good you broke it. You're on your way to being a diagnostician. Now, just enjoy yourself a little more. Turns out life isn't just about work, and you shouldn't realize that too late." The man put his cane down back next to him and turned on _General Hospital_. I pulled up a chair next to his bed and sat down to join him, hopefully find out more about him.

"Who are you really Bob?"

"Shh! Not a commercial."

I waited until the commercial and asked again, "Bob, I know that's not your name. Who are you?"

"I'm someone who has been forced to take an interest in your life. Only way for me to save my soul is to save yours first."

His statement scared me. What did he mean? I didn't even know him, and here he was, telling me in some sadistic manner that he was going to save my life.

"What do you mean Bob? And tell me the truth or I'm getting you transferred to psych."

He sighed, telling me that he meant to tell me something but couldn't.

"If I were to tell you the truth, you wouldn't even believe me. Go to church tonight, then you'll know more."

"I'm an atheist."

"So was I."

I stood up, shaking my head in disbelief. Who was this man to tell me what to believe or what not to believe. I hadn't gone to church since my husband's funeral; I stopped believing that day, questioning the true quality of the love from a deity when a young husband and wife were separated by an un-just war. I supported him and his friends, just not their Commander-In-Chief.

"And besides, knowing Foreman, he's put it in place that only he can be the one to transfer me anywhere, and he doesn't even seem to know who I am. Pity really."

I turned around and walked back to his bed. "I'm tired of your games. How does Foreman know you? Who are you? Tell me or I'm going straight to him."

"He thinks I'm dead, or at least he thought so until I called him today. I'm probably the only reason you're still working at this hospital. Go to church."

"Tell me more."

"Go."

"No."

"Fine." He picked up a pen and the bible from his nightstand and tore out a sheet, writing something down quickly in poor penmanship. He held the paper out to me and said, "Take some time to visit her. She can tell you."

I took the paper from him, and in the corner of the page read a woman's name and professional title: "Allison Cameron, MD Director of Immunological Studies, Northwestern University." The name sounded familiar, but I didn't know how.

"She can tell you more, but if you go, I'm coming with you. Don't tell Foreman where you're going though. They know each other."

I stared back at the paper in my hand. Nothing made sense, and I was beginning to be glad that it didn't anymore; I didn't like my life or myself when it did.


	7. Day 5

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Day Five:**_

Insanity. In the years since I've graduated high school, the world had changed drastically. What were once guaranteed rights by our constitution were now fables told in history classes about the dangers of absolute freedoms. Everywhere you turned, a police officer stood waiting to check your identification. Every phone call made, e-mail sent, fax received was being monitored by a man in a black suit in an office across the nation, wearing a badge and hiding behind a gun. People used to say the future was bright, but I haven't seen the sun in over a month; it's only hazy and dreary out.

Loss of revenue in the health care industry had changed the course of medicine as we once knew it. Though the US was never really known for its health care system, everything degraded after Bush Jr. left office and handed over to his cronies. Now that no one could health insurance, doctors found that their income had dropped drastically. I made only a little over $22,000 a year, and am still paying off a large debt; only a mere fraction of what I made as compared to my residency in pathology.

Now, I sit in my office, staring at a note given to me by a crazed patient, one who is laying a puzzle out in front of me for me to solve. A puzzle that I really would care not to solve; I haven't wanted to do anything since my husband died. Yet, each time I try to get up to leave, to go home and find solace in the warm comfort of my bed, that same crazed patient slash homeless man with the cane, is staring at me.

"I'm not going to see this woman from the note you gave me, I'm not supposed to go. All I am really supposed to do is be here for my patients."

"I was like you once, minus the whole 'be there for the patients' part; that part I ignored. Look where it got me," the man pointed down at himself and his shabby clothes he got back after he signed himself out AMA. "By the way, I just used the leg pain as a ploy to see what was going on here in this office."

"Well, you did manage to figure out the salmonella case, I have to hand you that." I looked down at the note in my hand and played with the loose fibers from the corner. "You did get me in trouble with my boss because of it."

The man smiled and picked up a red and gray oversized tennis ball that was found by my co-worker earlier that day behind a filing cabinet. As he spun it around in his hand he said, "Technically, I got you out of trouble too."

I looked up from the note in my hand and stared at him. Was he the man on the phone? Someone did call Foreman during our meeting, someone who had long since disappeared from Princeton. Did that man just recently resurface?

"What do you mean, 'got me out of trouble?'"

He tossed the ball up in the air, "Isn't it obvious? Of course, maybe you're too thick to be in diagnostic medicine. Try thinking for once, or do you need an old pro to do that for you too?" He looked at me, expecting me to read his mind, to connect two distant points with one line, to see what he knew. But I couldn't.

"I don't follow you Bob."

"You moron! I was the person who called Foreman today. I knew you'd get in trouble for following my advice, and I knew that he'd want to meet with you right away in the morning. I asked the nurse when he got in, told her that I wanted to thank him for the care I was given. She told me, I called. End of story."

No one called me a moron, not after completing training in both pathology and epidemiology, not after surviving all these years after nothing.

"But, he said you were dead? He didn't recognize you at rounds today. He doesn't know you Bob!"

"House! That's my name! And you're wondering how I know what I do about diagnostic medicine? I founded this department fifteen years ago. If you don't want my help, fine, I'll go back to my cardboard box on the street behind your apartment, which by the way, used to be mine."

I was furious, though I did not know about what. Though this man was answering questions that I've had for a long time, he was also a paradox; Foreman said this man had died. What was he doing here now? One thing was certain; by him telling me where I lived, and also knowing where I worked, he had officially become a danger to me. "Don't move," I said as I picked up the phone and dialed the extension to psych and informed them of this man.

"Watch me!" He stood up and started limping to the door, but the two orderlies sent down from psych were faster than him. Within a few minutes, Foreman stood in front of my desk, asking what had happened. Before I could tell him though, he picked up the note from that man.

"Allison Cameron? I haven't seen this name or this handwriting for years. Did you find this in your desk?" Foreman smiled at me for the first time since I began to work there. I had two options, the first was to lie and agree with what he said, hearing the end of this whole fiasco. However, that man still knew where I lived and he would be back. Instead I opted for the truth.

"That man, the one you admitted to diagnostics yesterday, gave that to me."

"Gave as in, it was in his pocket and he just handed it to you?"

"Gave as in he wrote it down in front of me. He told me his last name too, House."

Foreman went white and sat down in the chair that the homeless man had been sitting in just moments before. "It's not him, I would have recognized him today during department rounds."

"Doctor Foreman, you asked me earlier today where I had gotten the idea to go to the patients homes? It was his idea, not mine. He was the one who wrote in the red ink in the patient charts. He was the one who solved this case, not me."

Foreman looked at me, for the first time ever showing fear. "Doctor Livingston, Greg House died in a car accident ten years ago. Whoever that man is, he is just an imposter."


	8. Day 5, Evening

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Author's note: I apologize for the delay in the new chapters; there had been a family emergency I needed to tend to during this last week and not only was I not near a computer, but I could not take time to write as often as I prefer to do. Also, thanks to all the people who have read this so far; something big is yet to come, and I'm having fun giving you all these hints along the way. Thanks to the reviewers for your encouragement!

* * *

_**Evening, Day Five:**_

It always astonished me that people pay good money to go out an purposely poison themselves in the name of having a good time. Alcohol, nicotine, drugs, gambling; you name it, people will tithe away their weekly stipends just so that they can feel better about themselves and their situations for a mere moment longer.

So, here I sit, my chin propped up on a cheap bottle of vodka, too inebriated to properly hold it up, a cigarette in the left hand, and the right swirling the piece of paper House had given to me earlier that day. I had been charged with a task, one critical to so many people on so many levels, its serious ness overcoming me to the point of near destruction. But I was not alone in the venture of self-destruction; House had checked himself out of the hospital AMA and now sat next to me at the bar, regaling tales of "the good old days" when he was still working at PPTH.

"So why exactly am I supposed to go visit this Allison Cameron when I can just call her?" I asked, slurring almost every word and spilling droplets of vodka on myself and the bar.

"You ask too many questions."

"It's my job."

"Trust me."

"Why?"

We both paused; the forced stalemate in the conversation clearly apparent.

"You're good at asking question. Keep doing that in your professional life and you might turn out okay."

"Dr. House, I am asking you why you want me to travel half-way across the country to visit someone to get some answers when you are sitting here in front of me right now with those answers. So why?"

House put his drink down in on the bar and looked me straight in the eye; I knew he was about to answer my question. Instead he smiled a wretched smile and asked, "Why did you bring me here for drinks then? Guilty about going home to an empty apartment to get drunk alone? Real healthy." House raised his glass to me and took another sip of the cheap scotch.

I slammed my cigarette down into the ashtray so hard I burned my hand; I had put up with Houses' manipulating long enough. "Look House, I'm tired of these mental games you're playing with me as a pawn. I've put up with you long enough, and I've put up with Foreman and his "leadership skills," for even longer," gravity almost proved its worth when I attempted quotation signs, "It's frustrating and I don't have time for this. Why are you here House? What does my involvement in your life mean? Why are you doing this to me?"

House closed his eyes; a quiet pained look took over his face. I had just told him to end his game or start playing by my rules. He obviously didn't like it, but what choice did I have? My professional life, my only life really, was on the line because of him, and I was to the point where I could no longer tolerate the extra effort he was demanding of me.

"Your success ensures my freedom, and in the long run, your freedom as well." House quietly whispered, conceding to the truth with his eyes still closed, almost afraid to look in my eyes. He slowly stood up and gathered his few meager possessions from the bar; he dropped an old book from his arms, one so old the name had been rubbed off long ago. "I'd like to explain more, but you're not ready yet. That's why you need to contact Cameron; Foreman won't recognize his past and the rest of them are gone. If you're not going to Chicago, the least you can do is call her. Good night Doctor Livingston, I'll see you at the bus stop in the morning."

"No you won't." I whispered under my breath into the last sip of my vodka so as no one would hear.

House nodded to me and then walked out the door of the bar, the bartender asking if I needed a ride home. I paid my bill, being sure to tip well as few people could afford to go to bars any more, myself included. I stepped out the door and saw House disappear around corner; he never turned his head back toward me.


	9. Day 6

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

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_**Day Six:**_

Dewdrops are the essence of perfection; they are bound to the physical rules of nature; the laws of surface tension dictate that they must be perfectly spherical, no hard edges exist to their being. The rules of nature dictate that when they can exist and in what form; too warm and we breath them in as water vapor, lubricating our lungs and opening our pores, too cold and they become crystals of frost that turn the world into an enchanted ice kingdom.

Today as I walked over to the bus stop, I saw House sitting in his usual spot on the bench, shivering a bit in the cold, his clothing and possessions drenched in the dew from the overnight air.

"You're late," House growled at me without moving even a hair, "Your bus left half an hour ago."

"I know. I changed my mind and came after all."

"You're wearing jeans. Don't you have to work today?"

I walked over to the bench and draped the stadium blanket over the seat so I wouldn't get wet; it really was an arrogant move on my part now that I think about it. I sat down and took a sip of my hot coffee from my favorite mug, relishing its warmth that only met in comparison to the warmth of my Princeton sweatshirt House was now eyeing with jealousy. My husband Michael had given me that mug at our last Christmas together.

I was about to speak and mention why I was late, why I wasn't dressed in professional attire when House decided to start the conversation instead. "It really wouldn't kill you to invite me in once in awhile. I can't hurt you, and it would make my job a lot easier." House breathed his hot breath into his hands to warm them up. "Besides, I miss that furnace." House looked at me and smiled an adoring smile, trying to use his charm to bribe me into providing someplace warm to go for a while.

When I took another sip of my coffee, I realized that the few possessions I had with me out here on the bench - the favorite mug, university sweatshirt, and stadium blanket - were more than House even really left to his life. I looked down at my coffee and felt guilty, "Here," I said, handing the mug to him, "This will help warm you up." I gave him a small smile and started walking back to my apartment.

House took out the tattered book from under his threadbare coat and wrote something in it, putting it away and smiling at the cup of coffee now in his hands. "You couldn't have called in sick if you were about to drink this coffee, " I heard him call from behind me. "How many days are you barred from the hospital?"

I stopped and turned around, looking at him, the few stories of his brilliance I have heard, all from him nonetheless, coming to my mind again.

"Look. I know Foreman, and he will give you the raw end of the deal, such as a week's suspension without pay. You might as well invite me in and we can call Cameron when her office opens at ten." House looked at me with the warmest smile he could must in the chilling overcast weather. I felt my heart melt in pity, but I tried not to show it.

"Okay, come on in. You can warm up and take a hot shower. I think I have a few of Michael's things still that will fit you."

House stood up and started limping towards me, knowing far too well where my apartment was as it was once his. "That's good; it's the first time since his death you used his name."

I stopped where we both were, "How did you know?" I asked.

"Shall we go inside?"

Normally, I would never invite anyone into my apartment, let alone a homeless man I had just met who claimed to have lived there once and was supposed to ensure my future freedom. That was crazy. But, my need for answers and the pleasure of being able to help comfort someone again seemed to overrule any logical sense my brain was attempting to make.

House took his shower and I found some of Michael's old clothes from when he was still alive. Luckily, the two men were roughly the same size and build, so the clothes fit well. Now, we found ourselves in my living room sipping coffee and tending to the fire in the hearth. The overcast dawn had turned to late autumn storms, and I could tell House was grateful for the shelter again, even if it were mine now. We sat sipping coffee in silence for a good portion of the morning, each of us watching each other.

"It's ten-thirty. Cameron should be going over her files right now. Time for business," House said as he handed my phone and the slip of paper with her number on it to me. "Call her," House looked into his book, flipping a few pages and writing another note.

I picked up the phone, dialed through, and a woman answered on the other end of the line; after I identified myself, another woman quickly picked up.

"What can I do for you Doctor Livingston?" a woman I had assumed to be Allison Cameron asked boldly on the other end of the line. "My assistant told me you work at PPTH in Diagnostics, how is everything?"

I couldn't believe I was about to tell a perfect stranger about the difficulties in our hospital when she was probably having similar difficulties as well. "Well, that is why I am calling you Doctor Cameron. I had a patient come in recently through the clinic,"

"They still have that?" Cameron asked quickly; I could tell she was smiling.

I lightly laughed, relieved she was not annoyed at my barging into her busy schedule, "Yes they do, and all the doctors still try to find ways out of working it."

"Is Brenda still there?"

"Actually yes." Wonderful! We found common ground and had quickly broken the ice.

"Tell her I say hello; after the accident, she was the one that kept our department going. So, what can I do for you?"

What was I to say? How could I tell her that the man who had hired her at PPTH was now homeless? How much did she really know? "Well Doctor, I'm not sure where to begin, but I had a patient come in the other day who was eventually admitted to Diagnostics. Anyway, he had decided to wander the hospital the night after he was admitted and broke into the Diagnostics office, leaving a note in the file of our most active patient, a note telling me to 'go to their homes.'"

"Excuse me Doctor Livingston, but why are you calling me?" Cameron asked, and I was sure she was beginning to think I was insane.

"Two reasons. The first is that our Dean of Medicine, Eric Foreman, had created a rule preventing us from breaking and entering into the homes of our patients as he claims it is an invasion to their privacy, and I wanted to know why. The second is that the patient I was telling you about claims to be Doctor Gregory House."

There was a chilling pause at the other end of the line. "He can't be. Doctor House died in a car accident ten years and six days ago," my heart skipped a beat, but Doctor Cameron continued, "We need to meet in person."

I felt the phone slide down to my side as I looked across the room at the homeless man sitting in my favorite chair. The beating of my heart deafened any other sound in the room. What had I just gotten myself into?


	10. Day 7

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

_**Day Seven:**_

In my life so far, I have discovered that truth, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder. Take reporters for instance. They will interview the witnesses of news stories, as many as they can find, and each one will have a different view of what really happened. Where did the fire start? When? Who was in the building when it happened? How did the fire department find out? What really happens, in other words the truth, is as different and unique for each person as their own fingerprints or DNA. Statistically, neither one is really repeated.

Three people had told me what they thought was the truth about Gregory House, and I had made my way to Northwestern University to interview yet another, Allison Cameron. My boss told me he was dead, he told me he was alive, and I had a gut feeling that what I was witnessing was somewhere in-between. As a diagnostician, I had learned to approach life and medical cases from the standpoint of a reporter: I had to interview as many people as I could to find out what really happened. Even though House had checked out of the hospital AMA, he had in a way become my patient, and I apparently his, as we were both trying to figure each other out.

Now I sat in the antechamber to Dr. Cameron's office, watching a secretary type up reports and watching House tap his cane against the floor in an interesting 5-8 pattern; he had told me that he always loved music. The phone rang, we both looked up at it as the secretary answered; Dr. Cameron was ready to see me. I motioned to House to stay where he was and I walked into her office.

Quickly, I discovered where a fellowship at PPTH could at one point really get you. The office had everything: a view of the campus, fireplace, big oak desk, and even a couch and chair set. Dr. Cameron met me quickly near the windows and motioned for me to sit by the fireplace.

"Did you get the items I faxed over yesterday afternoon?" I had asked, hoping she could enlighten me on the owner of the writing from the note on the lab results of the salmonella outbreak patients.

"Yes, I did Dr. Livingston, thank you. I have to admit, the writing looks so familiar. It really does look like House's, but it can't be. I think I'm going too fast though. Do you know why you're here?"

I stopped. Why had I come? It wasn't to show my evidence of my patient to another doctor I had never met but to whom I was connected via history. It wasn't because I had free time and wanted to go to Northwestern. No. It was because House had insisted. When I told him yesterday what was going on, I had kicked him out. I later went back to the bus stop to apologize to find him instead laying on his side in the alleyway in agony; the leg pain had returned. I had insisted on taking him to the hospital, but he told me he would only see one doctor, and that was Dr. Cameron. So here we sat. I thought about Dr. Cameron's question and answered her, "I guess I really don't know why I've come, but I need to know more about this case."

"Well, first off, what do you know so far about Diagnostics at PPTH?"

I stopped and thought for a moment before answering. "Greg House started the department, and he hired three fellows, a man from Australia,"

"Robert Chase."

"You, and then Dr. Foreman. Something then happened about ten years ago that threw the hospital for a loop. Foreman mentions that it was the case that changed his life and career, he had been ill. Then there was an accident. The only one left from Diagnostics was Foreman, and he became department head. Two years ago, he became Dean of Medicine. That's it really. Even then, I didn't know about House from him, only from you and the man who claims to be him."

Dr. Cameron took a moment and stood up, walking to a bookshelf and taking a photo album from the nearest shelf. She opened it to a page and smiled, almost crying but catching herself before she did. She handed me the book, "Here, this is us from when it was still good. You need to see this. That man there, on the right hand page, upper right hand corner, is House."

I looked at a picture of a man sitting at his desk, obviously mid argument. It must have been his birthday as a small cake was in front of him lit. He was arguing with two other people around him, one was Foreman and the other was a handsome man with floppy blonde hair. Foreman was obviously annoyed and the other man was smiling. But they weren't the two who caught my attention. Sitting in the middle at a desk was the man I recognized from the bus stop; he hadn't changed a bit. It was House.

Cameron asked, "So, this person you claim is House, does he look anything like the man in the middle of that photo?" She picked up the photo album from me and started acting analytical and scientific again. She too was conducting her own investigation at the moment.

"Actually, they look identical."

"Can't be. I was there when he came into the ER. Him along with Cuddy and Wilson. Cuddy was the Dean of Medicine at that time and Wilson was House's best friend and the head of Oncology. I loved both men, and I think you need to know that. Cuddy and Wilson were DOA from the accident; House was in a coma and Foreman was the one to express the sentiment that the brain damage was too severe for House to ever wake up again. Three days later, House had gone missing from the ICU and was never found again despite having the police even hunt for him."

"So he could be alive?" I had to ask. If there were no body to confirm death, how come everyone was telling me he was dead? Seeing is believing, and I've always tried to follow that motto in my professional life.

"House had this motto, 'Everyone lies,' and he followed that motto to his end day. Maybe he is alive, but everything points to his body having been stolen from the hospital." Dr. Cameron had begun to tear up in her eyes.

"In my experience, there are always different takes on the story. Truth like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Is the sky blue to a blind man? No. He cannot see the sky so he cannot say that it is. He is told it is blue by everyone else, so he accepts it as truth. But to him, the sky and everything is always black. Doctor Cameron, you tell me today that House could not be alive, but did you ever see his body? Was he ever found?"

Dr. Cameron was trying to conceal her crying now, "No," she answered meekly, he back turned to me.

"I apologize, but I need to know more. What happened to Chase?"

"There's more to what happened to that accident. Let me start from where everything began to go downhill." Dr. Cameron had taken a tissue and wiped the tears from her eyes. I heard a dull thump from behind the door; House was getting restless and was probably listening in. "It all started when Foreman had become ill and almost died. He never did recover from the illness. Well, that started to unravel House's confidence, and about three months later we received a case. Foreman and Chase were ordered to the patient's home where they could not disable the security system. Foreman ran and made it out, but Chase tripped and was caught by the police who held him for unlawful entry. The patient, who didn't really care for any of us, pressed charges. Chase was deported back to Australia and hasn't been heard from since. House was reprimanded by Cuddy and the board eventually took away his department head status. Then, a couple of months later, the accident occurred. House had been driving."

By that point, Dr. Cameron was in tears, "I'm sorry," she squeaked out quietly.

"It's okay. It's human nature to cry," I said, myself feeling the sorrow that she had become witness to. "I'm sorry about what happened and it must have been hard to have been there during that time."

"Thank you. Actually, PPTH was never the same and I left shortly thereafter, going from there to a hospital in Florida where I worked my way up to Immunology Department head, the youngest there. Now, I'm here, the first chairman of this department. That fellowship under House had opened up doors for me I would have never considered before. I guess had the tragedies not happened, I would still be there in that department. Truth is, I miss him dearly, and I missed him, even when I was in the same room with him,"

Suddenly I heard the door behind us open and close quietly, a new presence had entered the room, "Don't miss me anymore Cameron."

Dr. Cameron looked up and her jaw dropped, a look of disbelief overtook her tears.

"House! It's really you!" She got up quickly and ran over to him, where she hugged him in greeting. "I thought you were dead."

"So did I."


	11. Day 7, Evening

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

Author's note: I know I have taken several twists and turns in this story, and it has been awhile since I've updated (research and life). Here's what happened so far:

Sandra Livingston is a doctor working in Diagnostic Medicine at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in the year 2016. House, Cuddy, and Wilson have disappeared with questions surrounding their deaths, Cameron has taken a teaching post at Northwestern University, Foreman is now Dean of Medicine at PPTH, and even though Chase is mentioned as being dead, he is not (I will reveal what happens I promise). House has suddenly reappeared after ten years being thought dead, only now, he is a homeless man.

Several things that will help in reading this: remember as you read this the mantra, "Everyone lies," because it is key in figuring out the mystery (each chapter has some lies in it told by characters for various reasons, especially Foreman); the narrator plays with entries in a journal of sorts, and each start out with clues to the final ending; each chapter has some clues in it as well.

* * *

_**Evening, Day Seven:**_

Stories can be more powerful than truths. Ancient persons passed down stories generation by generation to keep their truths and to keep their histories; these stories were later recorded into such books as _The Bible_ and _The Qur'an._ I even read Ray Bradbury's book _Fahrenheit 451_ shortly before the government had banned it; this book too dealt with the passing of stories aurally from generation to generation (too bad they also banned non-Christian religious books out of fear of terrorism - we could have learned a lot). Each story I've ever read has had relevance in my life, except one, the one most people find the most comfort from.

Why am I so reminded of these stories? Why do these stories suddenly bring me comfort?

I am sitting on the worn bed in a hotel room on the outskirts of Chicago. In its heyday, this hotel had probably been a rather decent one, but now, it has shown its age. The mattresses in the room have sunken in, springs poke out in random spots. The sheets and walls have stains that are too old to ever be removed without a fresh coat of paint, and the television has long seen its last day in times once forgotten. The last time I was at a hotel willingly was on my honeymoon.

Times forgotten; too many things have been forgotten.

I had left House at Dr. Cameron's office at Northwestern as the two wanted to talk privately; I made it my point to show myself out. Was it really my place to have paid his way here just so they could visit? They had some chemistry, yes, but not a lot. I don't know why Cameron's secretary was so happy to see the two of them together.

So, here I sit, in a hotel room, alone with a cheap pad of paper purchased at Walgreen's and nothing else to do. I lie back on the too painful mattress and the bedside table falls forward; a red book falls to the floor. I look at it and see the word "Gideon" barely embossed on its worn cover. Why is this here? How did this survive all these years in this hotel? I look closer and realize it is House's book.

I pick it up, and see a note tucked into John 11; why is House carrying a bible? I look more closely at the page and realize that it is the story of Lazarus. Why has House book marked Lazarus? I looked closer at the book and felt an envelope near the back cover. I took out the envelope and found a key and a note between House, who had apparently been using the name "Azrael" and a mystery person who used the name "Gabriel." What was going on.

First the key - why did it look so familiar? I went to my jacket pocket and fished out my own keys; the key House had been carrying in this bible was my apartment key. Why did he still have this key? Hadn't the door locks been replaced after each tenant for security reasons? Gut instinct was starting to betray my trust in House. What was going on here?

Second - the note. Azrael was the Islamic angel of death. Or was it law? I could never remember. And, Gabriel, wasn't that one of the archangels or something? I looked at it closer and realized that my name was in it, and the words "Save her and you save yourself." What was really going on? As I began to examine the note closer, the door opened and House barged in drunkenly, not noticing what I had in my hands.

"You have a meeting scheduled with Cameron tomorrow morning, you can thank me later." House stumbled further into the room and collapsed on the other bed, the smell of cheap alcohol evaporating from his sweat overpowered all other sensations.

"What is this note?" I asked, holding it in front of his face as he stared into the oblivion of the stained, cracked ceiling above us.

House took a moment and grabbed the note from me, "It's nothing."

"It's something, my name is in it, that _key_ is identical to mine."

House blinked and rubbed his alcohol-weary eyes, "Your landlord is cheap - never changes the locks. Remember, I used to live there?"

I grabbed the bible House had been carrying around and in a fit of rage, threw it at his outstretched abdomen, a hiccup of air escaping his lungs as he reacted to the sudden impact of book meeting creep. Whatever was going on, whatever game he had been orchestrating, I wanted no more, and I told him so. My lecture had suddenly sobered him up.

"You've come this far, you are so close, and now you're just giving up?" House bolted at me as I pounded towards the door, moving too quickly for a man missing too much thigh muscle. He got in front of me, blocking the door, "You can't leave yet!"

"Watch me!" I reached for the doorknob but he gently grasped my wrist before I could get that far.

"I haven't been completely honest, well, I have, but not to the extent that you apparently need to believe." House guided me back across the room and sat me down at the broken table near the window. "You have questions, and I understand that. You are impatient at people withholding information from you, and I understand that even more, but you need to trust me right now and not your instincts. The world is bigger than you think! I learned that lesson the hard way."

I looked him straight in the eye as I tried to pull my wrist from his gentle grasp. He wasn't hurting me, but I was uncomfortable with someone being so close to me. Rather than picking up my subtle hints, he continued with his speech.

"I used to think that, no, I used to know that there were things that were not possible because I could not explain them using rational thought. I used to know that we are born, we live our lives, and when we are just getting good at everything, we die, returning into the nothingness that we are all born from. Ten years ago, that all changed."

Ten years? House released his grasp on my wrist and went over to the bed where his bible lay open, taking out a newspaper clipping and handing it to me, "Seeing isn't always believing."

_TWO DOCTORS LEFT DEAD AFTER ACCIDENT, ONE MISSING_

_PRINCETON, NJ - Three notable doctors from Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital were confirmed to be dead early this morning after the car they were traveling in lost control. Gregory House, head of Diagnostic Medicine, James Wilson, head of Oncology, and Lisa Cuddy, Dean of Medicine, were rushed to the Princeton Plainsboro ER. Cuddy and Wilson were pronounced dead on arrival, however, House, who had been in a coma from critical injuries, went missing after being admitted. It is believed the three were celebrating Cuddy's birthday..._

"Wilson and I had tricked Cuddy into leaving the hospital for the night, we were trying to get her mind off the stress of the hospital and her trying to get pregnant. We were just going down the block, and I lost control of the car. I don't even know what happened. One minute I was driving, the next I saw myself being wheeled into the PPTH ER."

…_A new mystery surrounds the disappearance of the body of House as doctors confirm there was no possible way he could have recovered from the accident, as his injuries were too severe. Police are looking into the possibility of kidnapping, however, there is no evidence that a crime was committed..._

"I remember seeing Foreman performing the neuro-checks on me, trying to get my GCS. I wasn't even responding to pain stimuli. I saw Cuddy's and Wilson's bodies in the room next to mine; how could I have done that?"

… "_When they brought House into the ER, I was the one to take over his care. The vital signs he was showing were all over; we were unable to stabilize him before taking him to the ICU. He couldn't have just gotten up and walked out of the hospital, despite what anyone says." Neurologist and Diagnostician Eric Foreman was quoted in a press conference early this morning. _

"Foreman, he's always had something against me."

I looked up from the article, momentarily dazed and confused by what I was reading and who was sitting in front of me.

"If you're worried that I'll hurt you, don't worry because there is no way that I can. I can help you however."

…_Charges are being considered to be filed against House for the deaths of Cuddy and Wilson, however police do not know what to make of the disappearance of a man who should be dead. A mystery remains, shrouded in secrets and scandal, hidden, cleansed within the walls of this hospital._

I put down the article, wondering what was going on, what unseen forces were at play, using my life and my livelihood as its pawn in this now deadly game. Two people were dead, and by all accounts, their killer might be sitting in front of me. I knew that I should have called the police, but what was I to say to them? Tell them that the ghost of a man who went missing ten years ago is sitting in front of me, trying to tell me the truth? There was so much I should have done, so much I should have sad, but all I could muster was a simple question, "What happened House?"


	12. Day 7, Evening Continued

IN THE LAST DAYS OF AZRAEL

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

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Author's note: To my reviewers, thank you so much. I've always taken each of your comments into consideration, especially ones that are critical to story elements (pairings in my mind are subjective - sorry). Sheep - thanks for your comment - I thought about what you said and weighed it against what House reveals in this chapter; change can happen, especially after what he's been through.

* * *

_**Evening, Day Seven, Continued:**_

"I shot the sheriff?"

I stood over House's frame, and even though he was below me, I felt as if he was towering over me still. What had just happened today? What were the facts? All I really knew was that House disappeared ten years ago after a car accident that killed his best friend and their boss, Foreman took over, Cameron left, and no one has mentioned what really happened to Chase yet. I needed to know what was going on, needed to know if my life was at stake. I needed to know if I was next. In a panic, and truthfully out of desperation, I repeated my question, "House, what happened?"

And he wouldn't answer. He instead stood up from his chair and took his cane, his bible, the key, and the other items and started to walk towards the door. When I called the question out to him again, he stopped and turned around asking me, "What do you know about me?"

I sat down in the broken armchair House had led me to moments earlier, watching his body language. My psychiatry rotation during my internship had inevitably taught me that in this point of questioning, it was important for me to give the patient space to reveal what was on his mind; or at least my gut instinct taught me so during that time. I thought about his question and chose my next words carefully, "You were the head of Diagnostics at the hospital, you had three fellows under you, and you and Wilson took Cuddy, your boss, out on her birthday."

House closed his eyes and unintentionally let out a small sigh signaling that my answer was not what he was looking for. As he opened his eyes, I saw the frustration mounting through a deep sadness that only years of separation could bring; I knew that look as I held it in my eyes too, because Michael's death had done that to me. What had done that to House?

House sighed again and walked over to the nearest place he could rest; he was noticeably in pain tonight and did not want to move more than necessary. "How much will you believe?" he asked me. I must have given a puzzled look as he clarified his question, "What do you believe in spiritually? Religiously?"

I looked at him and the sorrow deepened in both of us. "I'm an atheist," I stated matter-of-factly.

House looked down at the bible in his hands and sighed again, closing his eyes in the process. "Remember how I said that I used to know that there were things that were not possible because I could not explain them using rational thought?"

I nodded.

"The night of the car accident is when I learned the things that changed my life. Like you, I was an atheist. Like you, I suffered loss in my life; granted, she is still alive, but it was still loss. That night, I died."

What do you say when you discover the fabric of your existence, the essence of your beliefs, has been eternally flawed from the moment you conceived those thoughts?

"My life," House scoffed at the irony of his chosen syntax, "changed forever that night. I discovered that there was indeed religion and that I needed to believe in something, even if it was just realizing I could enjoy something, anything. I know you miss Michael, just as I miss Wilson and even Cuddy. That pain can go away, but it takes time and it takes work. I hope you realize that."

House let me take time to think about what he said and after a few moments, I had begun to formulate my argument. "How do I know that you aren't mentally ill?"

"Should have asked that earlier. Michael says he misses you too."

I cringed in pain when House said my husband's name. Hearing anyone, let alone him, say his name was like salt being poured into my open wound. "Don't you dare talk as if you know him!" I yelled. It had gone beyond personal long ago, now I just wanted to run from everything, escape my life and my circumstances, but I could not.

"Fine Livingston. Just as you've considered me as your patient, you have become mine, whether either of us likes it or not. Here's your differential diagnosis. You're suffering depression, your husband is dead, you have no friends, and your family won't speak to you. Your coworkers barely acknowledge your existence, you're broke, and you just sacrificed your last ounce of professionalism to travel halfway across the country with a homeless man you barely know and in fact just met to dig up some mystery from the past that should have been long since forgotten. That's your life, how do you like it?"

I was trying to contain the tears that had welled up in my eyes, my body was shaking so badly and small whimpers were coming from my throat. As much as we are taught to acknowledge the truth, it often hurts, and hearing every lie I ever told myself suddenly being broken by a stranger with a legacy to my past changed my entire life.

"The truth is hard, but face it, you have nothing left but that job, and you just risked it for me, Foreman will make sure of that. I was the same way once. Only difference is, you have a chance to change, a chance to save yourself before you can no longer tempt fate. It's been ten years since I've seen my friends; they both had something left to their lives, and I needed to find mine before I could see them again. You were my last hope, and now, at this critical moment, you've stopped trying."

I was still shaking; I was in shock over what this man who called himself "House" was telling me. What had I done? Why did I take in this homeless man as my new pet project? Could I believe him?

"I had nothing left Livingston, and even though you don't either, you still have a chance to change. You are my last chance, the last name on my list, the one who would be the biggest challenge. Michael wants to see you again, he told me to save you as he could not."

Fear and anger overtook me suddenly at the mention Michael's name again, "You cannot know Michael because Michael is DEAD! GONE! FINITO! He DIED fighting a war."

"He died a hero's death. I died too; I've discovered a lot since that accident that I thought could have never existed, you're fortunate that you're finding out now while you still have a chance. Don't waste away your life like I did. You're young; you still have a chance at whatever you want. I'm old, dead, and my only chance is for you to realize that you can live, I can't."

I stood up and gathered my things, fully intent on leaving upon hearing this madman's words. "You're a crazy old bastard. House died ten years ago, you're impersonating him, using me and his former co-workers to find your own personal gains. You can't play with people like this."

"I just want to see my friends again."

"You've probably met plenty scamming them the way you're scamming me now."

"You want proof? Foreman pronounced me dead. Call him. Cameron was there. Call her. Chase even saw all of it. Call him, here's his number," and House handed me a slip of paper with Robert Chase's name, credentials, and an Australian phone number. "Let yourself trust me, and everything will be okay."


	13. Day 8, Early Morning

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

* * *

Author's Note: Wish they were mine, but they aren't. Orwellian world is, and so is Sandra Livingston, but everything else belongs to TPTB. Please don't sue, I'm broke.

Also, thank you all for the wonderful and thoughtful reviews - keep them coming in. Chase's destination is somewhat revealed here, but his story isn't yet. More and more of the details of this story are coming from your comments.

* * *

_**Day Eight, Early Morning:**_

When had the world turned into a paradox? When did I come to this private epiphany? Did it happen quickly overnight while I attempted to sleep, the sounds of House snoring in the other room waking me repeatedly? Did it happen the other day when I was not looking; instead wondering about the newest list of symptoms this patient had yet to present with? Or did it happen slowly over time; the wonder years of the late 1990's giving way to an Orwellian nightmare no one has yet recognized but everyone is silently aware of?

No matter what had happened, I lie awake silently in my bed at four am; too early to do anything useful for the day, too late to go and find something to distract me for the night. What had I just experienced last night? What had really happened?

I turned over once again and reached to the nightstand where I found the Gideon bible left there ages ago. It had been so long since I had ever believed in any sort of an afterlife that I had it felt odd to even be questioning the existence of things I had once termed as being part of the global imagination. On top of the nightstand, next to the broken and quietly buzzing alarm clock, sat two notes with names on it. The first was that of Allison Cameron, who I was to meet with again today. The second was the name of a person I had just heard of in passing yesterday, Robert Chase. Though the letters "M" and "D" were still behind his name, the phone number on the sheet was connected with a bar on the outskirts of Sydney called "Parados."

I wanted to suddenly escape from everything, get away from this crazy quest, from my crazy life, and start anew. Was it all that crazy to jump ship, travel across the world, and open a bar? No, not anymore. A week ago, yes, it would have been, but not now. I suddenly found myself longing for the life I imagined that this Robert Chase had developed for himself after going back home. Of course, I had never met this man, nor had I any idea about what had really happened to him; I always was a romantic at heart.

Overcome with yet another bout of insomnia, I put on my shoes and gathered my jacket; I was going to go for a walk, no matter how unsafe the idea really was. I took my key and as I walked past House's room, I listened in - still asleep. There was no doubt in my mind that after last night he wouldn't be awake, or at least functioning, until well after noon. When I approached the lobby, the night manager called me over to the front desk - I had received a fax from a familiar number with a familiar logo on it. Hard to imagine that after all these years, technology had changed little, if at all.

* * *

_TO: SANDRA LIVINGSTON_

_FROM: ERIC FOREMAN, MD DEAN OF MEDICINE _

_PRINCETON PLAINSBORO TEACHING HOSPITAL_

_TIME SENT: 10:49 PM EST_

_RE: EMPLOYMENT_

_Dr. Livingston,_

_It was hard to find you, but you need to know about this. _

_The board and I had an emergency meeting this evening, and I am sorry to say that your name had come up several times. It is upon further discretion of the board and of this administration that we have extended your suspension without pay for an additional week. Upon completion of this week you will meet with a PPTH attorney who will guide you through the steps before the disciplinary board. _

_Upon your return to Princeton, or if you have further questions, please call me. Maybe we can work something out._

_Eric_

_PS: I do love that dress you wore to the gala last March. Maybe you could show it to me in private?

* * *

_

Scoundrel. I wanted to rip up the fax, tear it apart into as many pieces as my heart had been torn into over the course of my lifetime. I wanted to discard it, but knew I needed to keep it as evidence. Foreman was playing good cop bad cop with a side of sexual harassment as well, and it needed to be known.

I stared at the cold hard words on the piece of paper, and rage quietly turned into tears as I ran from the hotel lobby back to my room, locking my door; sobbing silently into my pillow so as not to wake my traveling companion. I was quickly losing everything I once had.


	14. Day 8, Midday

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Author's Note: Wish they were mine, but they aren't. Orwellian world is, and so is Sandra Livingston, but everything else belongs to TPTB. Please don't sue, I'm broke.

Took awhile to do this chapter. Hugh Laurie once mentioned that the first half of a story where you get the characters into trouble is easier than getting them out of trouble. I agree with him. Also, had several gigs (pit orchestra and other stuff) the last few weeks.

* * *

_**Day Eight, Midday:**_

Somehow, life turns into a fanciful world in our dreams, a world that sometimes allows us to live our lives in a fashion that we could never afford, owning luxuries we could only imagine in, well, our dreams. Other times, our dreams turn into a frightful world, one where our dreams of consciousness only exist to taunt us while we live out our worst fears of the demons of failure and the monsters of lost opportunity chase us until we wake, screaming.

When I had gone back to my room at the hotel, I cried myself to sleep, and saw myself in a dream, back with Michael. We were there, holding hands, my quest to find him had finally ended and we had been reunited. House was there too, he was the one reuniting us.

But it was only a dream. Only a moment from my subconscious mind, long ago past, though I wish it were really now. I would take that dream over my reality in a heartbeat.

But now, instead of in Michael's arms, I find myself in the antechamber to Allison Cameron's office once again, my hands tightly wringing the fax from Foreman out of frustration and my bag gently slipping off my shoulder yet again as if it is trying to tell me to give up the fight and let this whole mess go on without me. I looked at the back of the fax, where I had written the name "Robert Chase" as a way to remind myself to ask about him, to find out what had happened, why he was no longer here.

"Dr. Livingston, you can go in now, Dr. Cameron is expecting you," the secretary whispered to me. I thanked her and found my way over to the couch near the fireplace again, where I had sat yesterday, where Cameron sat today, staring at a picture of her, House, and a man in a white lab coat with shaggy blonde hair. I said my salutations and Cameron invited me to sit down.

"Dr. Livingston, do you know why I have asked you to return?"

I glanced back down at the picture Cameron held in her hands, and could just barely see light stains where tears had once graced the glossy surface, drying and leaving their salty deposits. I looked back at Cameron and answered a simple answer, "No."

She smiled grimly and realized that I had caught her at a vulnerable moment; she quickly sat up and put the photo to her side, clearing her throat in the process. I could tell that mere moments before my arrival she had been crying. "I asked Dr. House to invite you back because there is more you need to know. First, know that I do not have all the answers, and by the sounds of it, neither does House. In the end, you will know what you need to know from me and from him; everything will be revealed at its own time when you are ready for it. The things I need to tell you today are only part of what you need to know, but it is all I really know and understand about this situation. Second, do not trust Foreman, he is out to use you to discredit what is left of House, even if it is only in memory. Foreman has already discredited doctors better than he, and if it were up to him, he'd take out whomever he could as quickly as he could.

"Foreman called me early this morning and asked me to gather information on you to discredit you at PPTH, much in the way he has probably asked your co-workers to do the same. They probably will, as it will probably mean the difference between even a part-time job and standing in line at the unemployment office. This is not the first time he has done something like this to save his reputation. The first time he did so, that I am aware of, was when we were fellows. He had become ill with a brain parasite, which had affected his spatial reasoning skills.

"One day, we had received a new case in Diagnostics. House had assigned Chase… You remember him, right?"

"Yes I do." I adjusted the paper in my hands, maybe Cameron would tell me about Robert Chase without my asking.

"Anyway, House assigned Chase and Foreman to break into a cop's home to search for potential causes of the illness. When they had gotten there, they inadvertently set off the cop's security system. The alarm blared and both men ran, but Chase tripped, falling down the stairs and breaking his leg in several places. He called for Foreman to help, but Foreman just kept running. When Foreman got back to PPTH, he told us that Chase had been arrested as well as his side of the story; that Chase had set off the security system but insisted on staying. It wasn't until Cuddy and the hospital lawyer showed up in the office a few moments later that we gone some semblance of the real story. House was furious and set about getting Chase out, but couldn't. Chase's papers had expired and he did not have time to renew them.

"The lawyer managed to get the papers worked out, but after the accident, Chase was deported anyway. I later found out that Foreman had spread his version of the events around the nursing and law staff. Rumors became gossip, and gossip became apparent truth. Chase is in Australia now, teaching diagnostics at a hospital. He managed to get out before Foreman's lies got rid of what little he had left. Be careful of Foreman; tread lightly around him. I imagine that's the fax he sent?" Cameron motioned at the paper, now crumpled, in my hands.

"Yes, it is."

"He sent me a copy as well. You can go after him for sexual harassment if you wish, but he'll have the hospital lawyers on his side. If I can offer you advice, just let him win. That hospital is his territory, and he has everyone there scared enough to side with him. You're better off resigning your position if he lets you than staying on or being fired."

I looked back at the paper in my hands, feeling a lifetime of dreams instantly being shattered. That job was all I had left.

"Also, Dr. Livingston," Cameron looked back at the picture of her, House, and apparently Chase and tried to not show any emotion, "listen to House, pay attention to what he does and what he has to say. He's changed since I knew him, time has caught up to him and he's trying to make good on the mistakes he's made in his life. He's been through more than you or I have in his life, so take heed on his advice and follow it. It might just save you in the end."

Cameron looked at the crackling fireplace in front of us, and sat quietly, trying not to show emotion, but allowing me time to think of any other questions that I had, which I did. "Dr. Cameron, what happened to you after Chase left?"

She blinked and looked lower into the fireplace, suppressing a sigh before answering me. "Foreman pushed me out. Accused me of plagiarizing an article he wrote. Ironic. He had done that to me the year before. Only this time, with Cuddy gone, he managed to convince the hospital lawyers to side with him. I managed to find a post here at Northwestern and quickly worked my way up to department chair. Get away from Foreman before he damages you."

I nodded, taking in her advice. "What happened to House? Didn't he die?"

Cameron looked back at the photo, "I don't really know what happened. He was in a coma, and three days later, he was gone. It was as if he just got up and walked out of the hospital."

I looked back at the paper in my hands and quickly decided that the fight was not worth it. I would resign from PPTH as soon as I returned to Princeton. I did not know yet what I would do with my life anymore, but working with Eric Foreman was no longer part of that plan.

"Dr. Livingston, before you go, remember that there is more that House will tell you. I can only really tell you those things. He knows more. Ask him."


	15. Day 8, Evening

**_In the Last Days of Azrael_**

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Note: Not mine, David Shore et al created them, I just am playing with them.

Also to recap, Sandra Livingston has been in the middle of a midlife crisis and has suddenly found herself in a difficult situation at work, where Eric Foreman has taken over the Diagnostics Department at PPTH in 2016. Somehow, House comes back to help Livingston out of her problems, and gets her to help him solve a few of his own. She has now met with Cameron and found out that House, Cuddy, and Wilson had died in a car accident years earlier but somehow House came out of his coma. Now, Livingston and House are in the bar next to their hotel in Chicago, where they had previously met with a still-mourning Cameron.

_**

* * *

Day Eight, Evening:**_

There was a guy I knew back in college who would always walk into a classroom and tell the same joke over and over. Really, it wasn't a funny joke, but he'd tell it anyway, knowing it would get someone's attention, which would be enough for him. _So this horse walked into a bar and the bartender asked, "Why the long face?"_ He wouldn't even really say a punch line, unless the bartender's question was meant to be that punch line.

Tonight, I find myself sitting at the dive bar next to the hotel House and I are staying in for the remainder of our stay in Chicago. Well, myself only, House is standing in front of the juke box, using his cane to flip through the pages of CDs that remain in there, most of them now dead rappers from ten years ago. And really, I'm not really doing much other than staring into a shot glass of cheap vodka that reminds me more of the taste of Novocain than anything else.

The events of the past few days, years even as not much has really changed in my life, seem to fly before my eyes, the bartender quietly ignoring me to tend to the lone customer at the other end of the bar. Where had I been and what have I done in the years since Michael's death? I had finished med school, which had been a major goal, but his absence dulled my senses and created a void in my life that I was unable to fulfill. While I had achieved my goals, the events of the past few days, of meeting House and almost being fired, had changed my view of the profession. Politics were politics, and I was to endure them under the wrath of Eric Foreman, then politics would be heated with games of chance, luck, and fortune, of which I was short all three.

A smooth jazz piano solo started to emanate from the depths of the old jukebox, suddenly shocked into remembering strains of a forgotten memory, and the look on House's face changed from one of inescapable pain to that of a forgotten pleasure. Judging by his closed eyes and the slight but ever so subtle grin, he would be there for a while. Bill Evans. The more the music played, the more the old man melted into the strains of the chords long since abandoned for music of lesser efforts. It was a simple piece, the same pattern cycling through itself in the lower strains of the piano and a distant melody filling in up above. I listened some more, trying to remember the name of the song that I knew I had heard before but could not place.

"This one's on the guy down there lady." The bartended handed me a beautiful red drink that smelled of tequila, cherries, and oranges. I picked up the glass and held it in thanks to the stranger at the end of the bar and felt myself for the first time in ten years smiling, just as slight as the smile that had taken over House's grim face. I realized that for the first time in a long time, I was at peace. I didn't care what was happening in Princeton, I didn't care what would happen to my job. I knew I missed Michael, but I knew that my missing him so much was what had caused so many of my burdens in the last several years. Was this House's doing; my suddenly being content? If so, I was grateful to the bastard.

As I sipped the drink, House fell more and more into the depths of the piano melody; not really a melody in the sense that there were repeating phrases and motives and familiar sounds that made sense, but a melody in the sense of someone telling a long and twisting story that makes you forget, for the moment, where you really are. I took another sip and the stranger at the end of the bar moved closer, looking into my soul with his dark brown eyes and smiling a smile that would make any woman's heart melt instantly.

I almost forgot to be miserable.

"I hope that man over there doesn't mind me giving you my attention," the stranger with kind eyes said to me as he sat down on what had been House's barstool.

I looked over at House who had quickly closed his eyes again (not wanting me to see him looking in my direction) and was smiling an even wider smile than before. "Well, judging by the look on his face, he's found his heaven for now. Have a seat."

"My name's Will by the way."

"Sandra."

"Beautiful."

I blushed quietly, gently rubbing the bare ring finger on my left hand and trying to think of the appropriate reaction to this new scenario in my life. In the corner of my eye I could see House nodding in approval at this twist of fate.

"I'm sorry Will, it's been awhile since anyone has doted over me."

"Then I'm sorry that I'm the first in awhile to do so."

House got up and put on another jazz piano piece, plugging extra quarters in the machine to make sure that I would be kept company for a while before coming our way. "An old man needs his sleep. Just be sure she's in before sunrise," he gestured at Will, "Or she'll miss her train."

"Your father?"

"Hardly. Barely knew him before this week. Kind of a crazy story actually."

"Isn't that what life is supposed to be?"

"Then this week has been life."

Will summoned the bartender and got each of us another drink. "To life, in all its crazy manifestations." We drank and we talked. For the first time since Michael's death I saw the good that had once been in people. I had finally missed the pain, the suffering, and the manipulations I had grown accustomed to back in Princeton from my coworkers and patients. When the time came in our conversation to discuss our actual lives though, that when the pain had come flooding back.

"So, what do you do for a living Sandra?"

I hesitated. How do you answer a question like this when the subject had become one you decidedly would rather avoid than face? I grimaced and decided to tell the truth, "I'm a doctor."

"Really?" Will sounded taken aback or in shock, I couldn't tell which but he was suddenly defensive.

I had to save this conversation somehow, "Or I had been before being given a week's suspension; my fate rests on if I decide to be ethical or not."

"What happens if you decide to be so?"

"I get fired."

"And if you play the game it sounds like your boss is stringing you through, then what?"

"I keep my job and be miserable. Will, I'm not entirely sure I should be telling you about this right now. I don't even know what you do for a living."

"I work at the free clinic down the road. Actually, I'm a doctor as well. I just stop in here after work to unwind before going home."

"Oh." I had said it just as the jukebox ended its mournful memories, the sound of my voice echoing through the near-empty establishment. I looked down into my glass and felt the awkwardness of the moment. I didn't want to think about work let alone sit and have drinks with one of my peers from halfway across the country.

"I offended you. We don't have to talk about this if you don't want to. Hospital politics were what drove me here to open the clinic."

"It's not that, it's just, well, I guess it is partially that. I had gone into medicine with the hopes to help the homeless somehow, whether it be to help get them off the streets or to improve their quality of life."

"Maybe I can help you out with that. We've been short staffed for the last year or so. The pay's not great, but there's fewer politics other than advocating for our patients' rights, and you'll be able to actually practice medicine at its most basic levels. Here's my card, think about it."

"I will."

Will had gotten up and started gathering his things when the jukebox started up again on its own as if a ghost had placed a quarter in the slot and selected the music. I kept rereading the card in my hand, feeling the ink that had bubbled up gracefully and just thinking.

"Sandra, would you have this dance? I love this piece, and the old man you were with had selected it earlier." Will motioned for me to come and dance with him.

"Sure. By the way, I know it's Bill Evans, but I can't remember the title."

Will smiled, "Peace Piece."

I smiled back. That was mine and Michael's song.


	16. Day 9

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Note: Not mine, David Shore et al created them, I just am playing with them.

* * *

_**Day Nine, Very Early:**_

"Good morning people of the night! Oh, he didn't stay. Good morning Doctor Livingston, what a fine day to be alive."

I groaned, feeling the full effects of the night before hitting me like an out of control freight train, "House get out of my room!"

House tussled the drapes open, taking every opportunity to be loud and obnoxious and to remind me of how hung over I really was. "Did you enjoy yourself last night?"

I stopped mentally fighting the obsessive old man and actually thought for a moment, albeit with two pillows stacked over my head to block out the painful sunlight and the grating of House's voice. "What the hell do you want House?"

"Two hookers and my best friends back. Wait, better make that three hookers, a bottle of Vicodin, and my best friends back."

It was too sad to hear that, but it was enough to get me to turn over and face the old man who suddenly had all he could do to keep from laughing. And I suddenly had all I could do to keep the room from spinning.

"What? Why are you snickering?" I demanded.

"You sleep in _scrubs_? _Scrubs!"_

"I do..." I looked down at what I was wearing as I was about to assure House that I was indeed wearing pajamas or at least my clothes from the night before, but somehow I was wearing a pair of green medical scrubs with an unfamiliar logo on the sleeve. A note was tucked into the shirt pocket:

_Sandra,_

_Sorry the night got the way it did, but you were having a good time. Plus, it looked like you needed just to be happy for once. Take it easy today, doctor's orders, and call me when you're up to it._

_Will __312-555-1212_

"Looks like someone played doctor last night."

"Stop it House!"

House shook his head and started playing with another envelope that was in his hand, and had been there all along apparently, as I tried even harder to make the room stop spinning. I looked at my right hand and saw a small puncture wound with a nice yellowing black and blue mark around it. Sometime in the last few hours I had an IV in my hand.

"You overdid it on the alcohol last night. Will and I took you to his clinic, he gave you IV fluids, and discharged you into my care."

"I didn't throw up on him, did I?"

"Funny you should ask about the young doctor's clothes and not mine," I felt a momentary pang of guilt. "Well, you weren't the best patient either of us had ever seen, but no, you didn't throw up on either of us. Actually, you just barely missed me and hit your clothes instead. Don't worry, I'm washing them right now."

I suddenly felt very vulnerable and even more embarrassed from not knowing what had happened as well as knowing the fact that somehow House and a man I had just met changed my clothes while I was blissfully semiconscious from acute alcohol poisoning. I pulled the sheets back over my head.

"Don't worry Livingston, we're all _doctors_ here, I only took a few photos. Foreman will get a chuckle out of them!" House was now practically jumping on my bed out of glee.

"If this is your game House, then leave me alone to die!"

House sat down on the mattress next to where my body had decided to flay itself out the night before. Or was it splay? I never could tell the two apart, even though both were true of the nature of my body at the moment. I tried to ignore him, but he inserted a sealed envelope in part of my right hand that was just barely visible to his eye.

"A messenger came by shortly after you had finally passed out; said to give you this."

"If this is how you're punishing me for getting plastered last night --"

"It's not punishment. In fact, I almost envy you."

"That's nice."

"'_Almost'_ being the key word. Open it."

House stood up and I slowly and carefully turned back over, the scent of the fabric softener from the scrubs sending new waves of nausea over me. The writing on the envelope looked familiar, and I could not be sure whose it was, but it looked almost like Michael's from years before.

_Azrael -_

_Be sure Sandra gets this._

_Gabriel_

Those names again. I studied it over, and House took the note out of my hand. "That one's mine. This is yours," he muttered as he swapped the envelope out for another.

"Who is this Azrael person? And Gabriel?"

"No one. Pet name. Doesn't matter. Read your letter."

Another momentary lurch of alcohol poisoning overtook me and I just complied with House's demand and opened the other envelope. This one was in the same exact script as the letter House had received; only this was marked with my name. My _pet_ name Michael had used with me and no one else had known, not even House.

_Seenya,_

_I just want you to be happy. That's all. Listen to what the world around you is saying and it will all play its way out._

_Michael_

"He's right you know. Had I taken that advice ten years ago, I would be happy now. But I didn't, and it's my job to make sure that you follow that advice in the letter."

"How could you House? Forging Michael's writing and using the name he called me? Where the #$& did you ever come across this? What kind of #$$#$ game are you playing here?" A hurt look took over House's face; my words had struck him harshly as I had intended them to. Now for the final blow, "I should have listened to Foreman when he told me you were insane. You are. Now get out."

"Fine. You want to allow yourself to be miserable for the rest of your existence, then do so. Just don't drag me down with you. I tried. It was my job to do so, and because of you and your petty disbelief in something bigger than you and your world, I have to suffer for even longer. You were my last charge. Now, who knows? You're an idiot Doctor Livingston. Have a nice life."

House grabbed his cane and other items and limped out of the room as fast as he could. I had gone too far and I knew it, but so had he. _He_ was the one who handed me a note from my dead husband. _He_ was the one who almost got me fired from my job. _He_ was the one who dragged me out to the slums in Chicago. _He_ was the one that made me try to remember how much I missed life. _He _was the one that created a night that made me feel happy for the first time in a very long time. I looked back at the note in my hands and cried; knowing that there was no possible way House could have forged this. What had I done?


	17. One Week Later

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Note: Not mine, David Shore et al created them, I just am playing with them.

* * *

_**One Week Later:**_

It is often said that people who suffer from depression refuse to get help because they are afraid of the unknown. They have apparantly known depression for so long that it has become an old friend, being there for them in both the best and worst of times. I, on the other hand, knew the depression as the feeling that filled the gaps in my life. Depression for me helped to pay tribute to my existence, and gave me a reason to live, if only to enjoy being miserable and taking refuge in its comforting arms. Of course, in the overall course of the disease, these are just stereotypical misconceptions.

It had been a week since I broke down in a hotel room in Chicago and it was time for my so-called "disciplinary hearing" at PPTH with Foreman and the board. I dressed the part of the doctor who cared and looked in the mirror one last time before leaving my apartment to hail a cab. One thing that had changed was that I could no longer bear to see House staring at me from his spot on the bus stop bench which he took up like a crow waiting for the death of the roadkill in front of it. I thought I had been clear when I told him to leave me alone in my own misery, but he had apparently been mistaken and decided to stalk me instead.

As I left the front door of my apartment, I saw the familiar figure with a cane look up momentarily from his newspaper (stolen from _my_ stoop besides) to scowl in my direction. I pretended to look past him and turned to start walking in the opposite direction, hailing a cab in the same motion. I made sure the driver turned before the car got any closer to the bus stop.

As I walked into the clinic entrance of PPTH, I was greeted by the same sneer that had greeted me at the bus stop. How did he beat me here?

"Good to see you back Livingston."

I smiled a false smile. "Thank you Brenda, it's good to be back." I looked over at the waiting room and saw House's sneer turn to an even more tortured look of pain and desperation. "By the way, the man with the cane in the waiting room. See he gets a psych referral."

"That week away to find yourself must have helped. You suddenly remind me of a former diagnostician from ten years ago."

"Don't push it Brenda, and it was two weeks. Just see to it with that guy, he's a basket-case waiting to snap."

"Okay Livingston. Foreman wants to see you right away." Brenda had walked off to talk to House and assess his situation. I saw him glaring at me as she took down his information for the general clinic form. Did she know this was House? Then again, it probably wasn't. It was probably just some homeless guy playing the part of this insane doctor who now lived on the streets to try to get sympathy from someone. That's the way the system worked. I looked back towards Foreman's office and saw him smile as our eyes met. Now what did he want?

"Sandra. I'm so glad to see you _again_." Foreman extended his arms in a hug around me. What was going on? What level would I stoop to now? I had already slept with him upon my return. If I could only see House's expression right now; of course, deep down I knew he was right and what I was doing would only prolong my misery.

I leaned into Foreman's arms and accepted the bitter peace offering. I had been told that I would be offered a compromise from the board, and today was the day that either I would reluctantly accept or decline.

"Have you given any thought to what we had discussed earlier this week?"

I adjusted the weight of my attaché case on my shoulder to give myself time to answer. "Yes, I did Eric." Smile, blink, shrug your free shoulder, and look him in the eye, play him for what he's worth. Play yourself for what you've become. "And I realize that I would enjoy being able to continue to be part of this team here at PPTH." Tilt your head, smile, look him in the eye, blink, and look away. Play innocent. Make him feel special. You have something he wants, even if in the long run it is just a form of prostitution, your career the payment of choice. "You know what I'd do _Eric_ to stay working under your tutelage." Touch his face, look him in the eye, and try not to gag when you kiss him on the lips; try not to reel when he takes you in his embrace.

You could feel House glare at you from across the clinic as you followed Foreman to the elevators up to the conference room. You just became one of those escorts House used to hire on the nights he couldn't stand to be alone.

You are cheap.

You are alone.

You are miserable.

You look back one more time at House as he looks at his watch and opens his bible, trying to ignore the form Brenda was helping him fill in. Part of you wants to be there next to him, asking the questions he has yet to answer, the questions he promised you he'd answer.

But that would not benefit you. You realize that you are viewing yourself from the third person, to protect yourself, your actions; create a reason why you are about to do what will ultimately save your career for a few more weeks so that you can set yourself up for more misery and even more deceit. But that will not help.

So I follow Foreman.

"Livingston, Foreman, need your help!" Brenda shouted from the clinic. We both turned around and saw House faking a seizure.

"He's faking Brenda. Call psych."

Foreman ran over to House and started assessing his situation, trying to determine whether the seizure was real or not. House could fake one rather well after all.

"Foreman, he's faking!" I called out again in vain.

"House?" I heard Foreman ask quietly, the shock of suddenly recognizing this man for whom he really was took over his form.

"Don't do this Foreman." House replied quietly from under Foreman's grasp, looking him straight in the eye.

Suddenly, Foreman threw House back into the chair and ordered Brenda to get a psych referral for him immediately. He walked back over to me; "We're doing this now. Come on Livingston."

What had happened to the casual use of my first name? Was I now just an expensive prostitute to him as well?


	18. The Disciplinary Hearing

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Note: Not mine, David Shore et al created them, I just am playing with them.

* * *

_**The Disciplinary Hearing:**_

"I think we all know why we are here today gentlemen. As you know, Doctor Sandra Livingston has been going against hospital policy and investigating patients' lives outside of the hospital as well as wasting diagnostic tests on patients for simple complaints that do not warrant such waste of valuable resources," Foreman continued on as I pretended care about what was going on.

I looked about the room and saw the faces of men I had once trusted professionally. Foreman, being the Dean of Medicine as well as the Department Chair for Diagnostic Medicine was present as my boss. A hospital lawyer sat next to him just as some cheap labor lawyer I found in the phone book now sat next to me. The other men were respected physicians at the hospital, many of whom I worked with on a regular basis and had nothing but respect for. Today was a different story.

"I think you'll find that my client was well within her justification to perform those tests as shown by what evidence we have assembled here today." My lawyer just had to speak up; all I wanted was for this to be over. I sighed and listened to more legal babble come from the board members and Foreman; I could no longer look him in the eye after what he admitted to me on the elevator.

"This is all just sexual harassment Foreman. You and I both know it."

"But who else can testify that fact for you?" the hospital lawyer asked as Foreman's neutral expression took on a devious smile.

I shook my head in disgust. This was hopeless. Even if I had a good lawyer, which I actually did, there was no way I could prove any of this. I had been weak and allowed Foreman to play with me and now he was tired of what I could offer. He was looking for a new toy. "Let's just get on with this." I motioned and sat back into my chair.

As my lawyer began to speak in my defense, a familiar cane pushed the conference doors open.

"House! Get out of here! Aren't you supposed to be in the psych ward?" Foreman yelled at House.

"Oh, I'm just going for a walk, thought this was the chapel. This looks more interesting though. Less Godlike, unless that's what you're going for Foreman. Mind if I stay?" House took Foreman's chair from him and sat down. "This is what it feels like. Oh, don't mind me, go on with your hearing."

"House, you can't be here. Get out." Foreman tried yet again.

"Actually, I can. See, I'm here as a witness for Doctor Livingston. See, I know you've been sexually harassing her. Of course, I don't blame you. She's awfully _cute_ in that lab coat after all."

"House!" This time I yelled.

"Also, she saved all those people from that salmonella outbreak two weeks ago. She wouldn't have done it had I not intervened and convinced her to break your hospital policies. It just wasn't their time!" House now openly mocked Foreman.

"I knew something was up when I realized it was you." Foreman yelled and then whispered something into the hospital lawyer's ear.

"The witness for Doctor Livingston can stay if it is approved by the board, Doctor Livingston, and her lawyer."

My lawyer looked over at me and I sighed, just barely squeaking out a "Fine," in the process.

"Livingston, why, he's just going to interrupt us."

"Foreman, you and I both know him, and we both know that it's just easier to give in to his demands right away. Saves us a lot of grief and hassle in the end."

Foreman contemplated what I had to say and took an empty chair closer to the end of the table. When asked if House could stay, the board had approved, hopefully in the attempt to end Foreman's tyrannical reign of power.

About a half hour into my testimony, Foreman's assistant ran into the room, "Doctor Foreman, there's an urgent phone call for you."

"I told you to hold my calls."

"This is one you'll want to take."

Foreman looked at House who replied, "Don't look at me, I had nothing to do with this." House then shrugged in my direction, this nightmare of a career just got ten times worse. The former then took his call.

"Okay, I can make this rare exception. Livingston, call for you," Foreman said as he handed me the phone. House smiled. Foreman cast him back a look that could kill.

I took the phone and barely recognized the voice on the other end as being a friend from Chicago. Will. He told me not to hang up the phone, but rather put him on speaker.

"Gentlemen of the board, my name is William Fitzgerald, and I am the head of the Good Hope Free Clinic in Chicago, Illinois. I would officially like to make an offer to Doctor Livingston to join my staff, effective immediately. We are prepared to match whatever offer you give her in response."

I smiled. Foreman threw a look of disgust at the phone and then at House who sat counting the holes in the ceiling tiles.

Suddenly, the phone clicked off and Will walked into the conference room. "What do you say Sandra?"

I smiled and ran towards him, being embraced by his outstretched arms and his welcoming smile.

"We have a meeting to finish here people," Foreman yelled, trying to take control of the room.

"You can't blame me for this Foreman," House nudged the younger doctor in the arm with his elbow.

"Save it House. We need to officially end this meeting before Doctor Livingston can accept or decline your offer, if the board finds what she did warrants no further investigation from the licensing board."

A board member spoke up, "What we see here Doctor Foreman is that she just went against hospital policy, not state policy. She can decide what she wants."

Foreman looked at Will and me in disgust, and I saw a huge smile on House's face. "Well Livingston, what do you want to do?"

I looked at House and Foreman, and then back at Will and smiled for the first time since I had seen Will. "I choose Chicago," I first said to Will and I turned around and looked at the board, "I choose Chicago!"

The meeting was called to an end, and before he could leave, I tried to catch House. "Doctor House, how can I ever thank you for arranging this?"

House looked at me and then Will, "Why do you think I did this?"

"You had something to do with it, right?"

"No." House started walking towards the door, the grim expression he had always worn taking over his face again.

"Wait, House!" I ran after him, noting that for the first time he was neither using his cane nor limping.

"This is it Livingston. I did what I had to, and you did what you had to. Now, go to Chicago, your patients are waiting."

"No, House. There's so many questions you have yet to answer. Like, who's Gabriel? Who's Azrael?"

House looked at me with a distant look on his face, "You'll find out soon enough. You did good kid, you learned what you needed to learn. Now go _enjoy_ your new career in Chicago, and say hello to Cameron for me. Lord knows she needs it."

And with that, I saw House walk away from me for the very last time, concealing answers to questions that had plagued me since the trip to Chicago. I wanted to know more, but House refused to acknowledge anything other than his leaving the building.


	19. One Year Later, Finale

In the Last Days of Azrael

A House fan-fic

By entercreativename

Note: Not mine, David Shore et al created them, I just am playing with them.

* * *

_**One Year Later:**_

Time passes on faster that we care to think about and faster than it can recognize. One year had passed, and Will and I had become good friends over that time. We dated for awhile but we both realized that we both had connections to other loves around us; mainly the clinic we worked at and the former lovers we both knew whom had died similar deaths in the service of our country. No matter how much we tried to form a relationship, we both knew that we needed more time to heal from our lost loves before we could try to take our friendship to the next level.

I had lived in Chicago now for ten months, having finally convinced my landlord to allow me to break my lease so suddenly and having found a place to live in the Windy City. Work was great, except the last couple of months made our clinic witness to some of the worst urban warfare the city had seen in over a century. Riots and chaos had taken over the streets of our city, just as it had taken of the streets of every major city in the country. The people had spoken and it was time to revolute.

The days that had passed had also dulled the events that led me here to Chicago a year ago. Just as I had quickly found my place here, I had quickly lost touch with the questions that had once plagued me. Fortunately, the clinic had given me a place to grieve for Michael and a place to take care of myself as well.

The morning had started out like any other morning at our little clinic; a few sick elderly, a few accidents, and a gun shot wound. Nothing out of the ordinary for us. Looking back though, a homeless man with a bible and a cane did catch my eye when I first arrived. Maybe that played into my gut instinct that life was about to change.

I had woken up that morning to the nightmare of the board meeting a year ago today. I knew it was the anniversary of my accepting this job, and I just told myself that the anniversary was darker than I thought it was. I dreamt that I was back in the meeting, but rather than it ending with House and Will walking in, a man in a black mask walked in an gunned us all down. The final bullet in his gun hit me in the upper abdomen just as I awoke soaked in my own sweat and screaming. I was left alone, safe in my bedroom, but with the feeling that something was over; what it was I could not tell.

We had finally come to a dead stop in our schedule; Will and I had seen all of our patients on the docket and it was time to take a moment's rest and meet to work out some of the paperwork that was ever-looming. We were at that time of the year where we had to renew yet another set of grants that kept money flowing into our project. Just as we had sat down in the office to discuss the latest ideas, a terrified scream came from the waiting room followed by yelling, and a gunshot.

Will and I ran to see what was going on, knowing that someone would need our care. This was not normally how we would have done this, but today we just did. I was the first to get to the waiting room where an armed intruder stood over the body of our nurse. I looked at the gunman's eyes and saw hatred. Just as I looked down at the body of the nurse, he took me and held me at gunpoint.

The rest was a whirl of color, sound, and the acrid smell of spent gunpowder. Nothing was in focus except one thing: the homeless man from earlier that morning I now recognzied as House who sat across the waiting room reading the Chicago Herald, oblivious to what was going on, oblivious to the fact that he could help. Before I could figure out what was happening, I saw Will leaning over me from my left flashing a penlight in my eyes and calling out, "Stay with me Sandra, stay with me." I just barely turned my head to my right and realized House was holding my hand, watching Will trying to keep me with him.

"You've been shot." One of the doctors above me was saying.

"Stay with me." The other doctor was pleading. Which doctor was which I could no longer tell.

Bright lights flashed above me and I could sense that I was in a different room. Was this our trauma room? Why was I here? I looked to my right and House still firmly held my hand in his, showing a small sliver of a smile as if to try and comfort me.

"House?" I heard my voice call from somewhere distant.

"Sandra, just breathe!" Will was commanding me to do something by body was unwilling to do.

I saw Will standing above me and felt him push a tube down my throat, but he was having difficulties. He called for suction, but I didn't know why. I was fine, I was okay. House would make sure the boogeyman would stay away, right?

Everything went black.

Everything shook.

And I could hear dancing shimmering on the walls around me.

Next thing I knew I was no longer lying on that gurney in our trauma room; it wasn't so much mine anymore as it was now just Will's. The hand that had been holding my own was still holding it, the rest of the body attached to that hand held me back where I was in the corner of the room. House held me back from comforting the doctor trying in vain to save my life.

"It's not my time." I whispered, a single tear slowly rolling down my face.

"You've been on borrowed time. Gabriel made a deal so that you could save yourself, with my help of course." House whispered as he tried to turn me from the sight of my dying body.

"Gabriel?"

"Gabriel is here in this room." House finally managed to maneuver me around and standing in the corner was my late husband Michael. "I told you that your questions would be answered soon enough," House said as he released me to run towards my husband, words at a loss to describe the feelings that were overwhelming me.

Michael took me in his embrace. "Thank you Azrael, I could not have done this without you."

"Is this it then? Is my time finally up Gabriel? Do I finally get to see my friends this time?" House asked, a new meekness overtaking his tone of voice.

Michael spoke, "Azrael, your time of servitude is done, you may go."

House looked at the other corner of the room, where a man and a woman, both wearing labcoats, walked towards him smiling. "Wilson! Cuddy! Your breasts certainly haven't changed."

The woman spoke up, "We haven't seen you in eleven years and the first thing you comment on is my breasts?"

"Better it was not something else," the man next to her said as the two received grateful hugs from House.

House looked around the room at our spirits standing there. Before he could say anything though, Micheal spoke up, "Today is the last day of Gabriel, just as today is the last day of Azrael. Thank you again Azrael for saving Sandra from the fate she was about to create for herself."

"Thank you Michael for making this the last day of Azrael."


End file.
